That night, Des left her cruiser in front of the firehouse and patrolled the Historic District on foot. Oly and two other troopers were prowling the District in their rides.
The night air was warm and sultry. If there was a moon up there she couldn’t see it. She strolled her way along the rows of exquisitely preserved colonial mansions, her big leather belt and holster creaking, eyes and ears open. She could hear the sound of TV sets coming from open windows. Someone somewhere was playing an unsteady version of “Stardust” on a piano. She saw a few folks out walking their dogs. And a pair of giggly young girls running down the street for home in their bathing suits, dripping wet from somebody’s swimming pool. But hardly any cars drove by. This was not unusual. The real action in Dorset on Saturday night wasn’t in the Historic District. The bars and clubs were down near the marina.
It was nearly nine o’clock when she came to a halt out in front of the Captain Chadwick House. Only one room was lit up at the Farrells’ place. Dex and Maddee were watching television or reading, she figured. In contrast, there were lights on all over Beth Breslauer’s condo. As Des started across the lawn toward the backyard she could see Beth through her kitchen window. Mitch’s first love was doing the dishes. Kenny and Kimberly were with her, the three of them chatting merrily, laughing. Already one little happy family. Upstairs, Bertha Peck’s unit was dark. She’d gone out apparently. Her garage door was down. All of them were down except for Augie’s. The man’s vintage, red GTO sat there, gleaming under his garage’s overhead light. There were lights on in his apartment upstairs, too. Music was playing. An old Neil Diamond record. She settled in among the arborvitae bushes that edged the property and crouched there, waiting for him to make his move.
Twenty minutes had gone by when she felt her cell phone vibrate. She glanced at the screen and took the call, keeping her voice down.
“I’ve got a hot prospect for you, girlfriend. I am talking sizzling.”
“Mitch, I thought you weren’t going to do this again,” she whispered.
“Do what?” he asked innocently.
“Go Nancy Drew on me.”
“I’d rather be classified as one of the Hardy Boys, if you don’t mind. Either Frank or Joe will do. I’m not picky. And you’re right, I was. But this kind of fell into my boxer shorts.”
“Into your what?”
“Des, I can barely hear you. Why are you whispering?”
“Mitch, what do you want?”
He was calling to tell her about J. Z. Cliffe, the burnout case who painted houses around town. How J. Z. had just left Big Sister stoned off of his gourd and just plain out there. Why J. Z.’s marriage to Kimberly had fallen apart. And why J. Z. remained filled with anger toward the Historic District’s “old prune-faced biddies.”
“J. Z.’s girlfriend, Maggie, slings drinks weekends at the Monkey Farm,” Mitch added. “That means he’s been footloose and fancy-free every single night our flasher has struck. His mom, Connie, has a big place right there on Dorset Street. He lives in her guesthouse. Refresh my memory-is Connie one of the ladies who’s been victimized?”
“That would be a no.”
“Naturally. No way he’d flash his own mother, would he? Well, maybe he would. But let’s not go there. I’ve already had a full dose of weird tonight.” Mitch fell silent. “You’re not excited. Why aren’t you excited?”
“The man’s a prospect, no question,” she admitted.
“He should be home in ten minutes. Are you going to shadow him?”
“Can’t. I’m sitting on someone else.”
“Augie, am I right?”
“Baby, just let me do my thing, will you?”
“I can sit on J. Z. for you. I’ll jump in my truck and head right over there.”
“Mitch, this isn’t Tombstone. I’m not deputizing you. And we’re not, repeat not, doing this. I’ll take it from here. Just watch a movie, will you?”
“The Mets are playing.”
“Even better. I’ll swing by your place later, if that sounds appealing to you.”
“Extremely appealing. It so happens I picked up some lavender oil at the health food store today.”
“And what are you planning to do with that?”
“Well, first I’m going to massage you with it from head to toe. And then…” And then he proceeded to describe in great detail what else he planned to do-much of it involving his tongue and her most private crevices.
“Um, okay, I’m hanging up now.” She flicked off her phone and waited for her pulse rate to slow back down to under a hundred. Then she called Oly, who promised he’d swing by the Cliffe place right away.
A car pulled into the gravel driveway of the Captain Chadwick House with a loud thump and started its way around back toward the garage. Bertha Peck’s powder blue Mercedes 450 SL convertible. It was coming hard and fast and not particularly straight. The old girl was potted. Almost took out a row of Maddee Farrell’s cherished Blush Noisettes before she screeched to a halt, using her remote control to raise her garage door. Bertha swung in way wide, very nearly scraping the side of her car as she pulled in. Then idled there for a moment with the rear half of the Mercedes still sticking out before she inched the rest of the way in and shut off her engine. She got out of the car, hit the switch to close the garage door and went tottering up the path to the mansion’s rear entrance, humming to herself. A few moments later her living room lights came on upstairs. Then her bedroom lights. Then her bathroom light. After a minute, Des heard her toilet flush, and sincerely hoped it didn’t choose tonight to clog up again.
By then her phone was vibrating again. Oly calling to report that there were lights on at Connie Cliffe’s house but that J. Z.’s guesthouse out back was dark. His van was there. His old MG ragtop wasn’t. Oly asked her if she wanted him to sit on the place. She suggested he resume patrolling but keep an eye on it.
Kenny and Kimberly came out onto Beth’s screened-in porch now, Kimberly stretching herself out invitingly on the love seat. Kenny flicked off the lights so that the porch was in darkness. Des could no longer see the two of them. But she could hear their soft, intimate laughter. Crouched there in the arborvitae, she was starting to feel like a sleazoid peeper.
A few minutes after that, Beth came tiptoeing out of the same back door of the building that Bertha had just entered, closing it softly behind her. Beth wore a linen blazer and clutched her purse in one hand. She did not head for the garage. Instead, she started up the driveway toward the street, staying on the grass so that her footsteps wouldn’t crunch on the gravel. When she reached the sidewalk she turned left and started down Dorset Street toward Big Branch Road, where the town’s shopping district was. Where in the hell was she going? Des wondered-although not for long.
Because now there was activity at Augie’s place.
First, he shut off the Neil Diamond concert. Then the lights inside his apartment. Then his garage went dark, too. She just caught sight of him in the darkness as he left the garage on foot, clad in dark pants and a dark long-sleeved shirt. He started his way across the expansive backyard, moving swiftly and quietly. Des took off after him, staying a careful distance back, one hand on her holster to keep the leather quiet. When Augie reached the low split-rail fence that marked the property line he paused, not moving, not making a sound. Des held her ground maybe fifty feet behind him, not moving, not making a sound. He seemed to be waiting for something. Or someone. Had he spotted one of the troopers cruising by? Was he on the lookout for Beth, his favorite stalkee? Because, hello, Beth had just gone the other way down Dorset Street toward Big Branch, effectively leaving him in her dust. It was so dark that Des couldn’t tell what Augie was doing. She only knew that he didn’t budge from his perch at that low fence for five minutes, ten minutes, fifteen…
Until suddenly he was on the move again. Climbing over the fence and moving with silent stealth across the parking lot that was behind the old grain and feed store next door. The building had been converted into law offices. Deserted on a Saturday night. It sat on the corner of Dorset Street and little Maple Lane. Directly across Maple Lane from it sat Rut Peck’s farmhouse, which was currently vacant. Old Rut had moved into Essex Meadows and put the house up for sale.
Augie crossed the lane and plunged his way into Rut’s wild, over grown yard. Des stayed right behind him, moving as quietly as she could. It was becoming clearer to her now-how the Dorset Flasher had been able to elude her sweeps. The man was never out in the open. He worked his way across the village by way of people’s backyards, driveways, little side roads. But she was on to him now.
And tonight she’d be right there to cuff him.
As Des pursued him across Rut’s yard a dog began to bark from a nearby house. A big dog with a husky bark. There were only two other houses on Maple Lane. One belonged to Nan Sidell, a single mother with two young sons. Nan taught at the middle school. Did she have a dog? Des couldn’t recall. But there were lights on at her place. The other house, which belonged to an old village handyman named Ray Smith, was dark. And Ray’s truck was gone.
Des came to a halt in the blackness of Rut’s yard, her ears straining. She couldn’t hear Augie’s footsteps now because of that barking dog. Couldn’t make out his silhouette either. Damn, had she lost him? She yanked her Maglite from her belt and flicked it on, its beam pointed downward. Saw a shiver of movement in the thicket of bushes up ahead of her-there-and flicked it off, moving in that direction. Down toward the Lieutenant River. Of course. The river snaked its way through the entire Historic District. Its banks were the Flasher’s own private highway. Mercifully, the barking dog fell silent now. Des could hear Augie moving his way through the brush again. Hear something else, too. A rustle in the brush behind her. Was someone else out there with them in the darkness? The dog? She turned around but saw no one, heard no one.
A car was making its way slowly along Dorset Street. It stopped when it reached Maple Lane, its high beams sweeping across Rut’s yard as it turned in. It was a state police cruiser. It was Oly. He eased his way down to Nan Sidell’s house and came to a stop. Des heard him get out. Right away, the dog started barking again.
Des took off, moving toward the riverbank out beyond Rut’s house. Hoping, praying, she hadn’t lost Augie’s trail. Footsteps. She heard footsteps in the darkness again-someone crashing through the brush right behind her. No, next to her. Wait, no, all around her. She whirled, her flashlight’s beam revealing nothing. Hell, what was… ? So fast now, too fast. Des heard a scuffle, a groan of pain, then a sickening thud. And now somebody was running again. She still couldn’t see a living soul in the dense, overgrown thicket. But she definitely heard somebody and started running hard in that direction-until she tripped over something and fell hard to the ground, her flashlight rolling off into the weeds. Cursing, Des got back up and retrieved it, pointing it down at the object she’d tripped over.
Augie Donatelli lay there in the tall weeds at her feet with the back of his head bashed in.
He had a very surprised look on his face. He wasn’t wearing a ski mask. Des saw no ski mask. He lay in a fetal position, as if he’d crumpled to his knees and then tipped over sideways. There was blood. A lot of it. And brain matter. A lot of it. A wooden baseball bat lay in the grass next to him.
Des sprinted through the brush after his attacker-only to find herself standing out in the middle of Maple Lane. She saw no one. Heard no one. Nothing. Just Oly’s cruiser parked out in front of Nan Sidell’s place. Oly was nowhere in sight. He must have gone inside the house. Nan’s dog was still barking.
Cursing, Des yanked her phone off her belt and called it in.
Dorset Street was no longer quiet. Dozens of Historic District residents were out on the sidewalk, talking and gawking. Maple Lane had been closed off. The Major Crime Squad’s techies were there from Meriden in their cube vans, along with a death investigator from the Medical Examiner’s Office. So were news crews from Connecticut’s four local TV stations, who were always up for a murder-especially when it took place in a ritzy village like Dorset. Rut Peck’s overgrown yard was cordoned off, the crime scene lit up by the high beams of several cruisers. More cruisers were sweeping the neighborhood for anyone who was out on foot. Anyone who’d seen anything. Anything.
It was a 911 call from Nan Sidell that had brought Oly to the scene literally seconds before Augie’s murder went down. Des knew Nan pretty well, having given a talk to the lady’s seventh-grade class about drugs last semester. Nan was a fragile-looking little blue-eyed blonde whose husband had left her a while back for his rather dumpy secretary. Nan’s two little boys were blue-eyed and tow-headed, same as her. Phillip, who was twelve, was lanky and tall for his age. Almost a head taller than his mother. Ten-year-old Peter was considerably shorter and pudgier.
“I’ve been keeping an eye on Rut’s house ever since he moved out,” Nan explained to Des, standing there barefoot in the middle of Maple Lane, her eyes huge with fright. Nan had her big yellow Lab close to her on a leash. Her two boys were right by her side. “Rut still has a lot of his furniture here. His silver, some antiques. I-I thought I heard someone messing around over there.”
“Messing around as in…?”
“Tromping around in the brush. Maybe trying to break in. I didn’t know. And then Josie started barking her fool head off, so I figured I’d better call it in.”
“You figured right, Nan. Did you see anyone fleeing the scene? Anyone at all?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“How about you guys?” Des asked the boys.
Phillip shrugged his narrow shoulders. “We were in bed.”
“Past our bedtime,” Peter chimed in, nodding his head.
“Sure, I get you,” Des said easily. “You’d turned in for the night, lights out. But Josie’s got a mighty big bark. Maybe she woke you up. Did you hear anything? Or maybe go to the window and see somebody?”
The boys exchanged a long, hard look before Phillip said, “No.” His voice was very firm. “Nothing.”
“Nothing,” echoed his younger brother, blue eyes gleaming.
The last to arrive from Meriden was a two-person team of homicide investigators from the Major Crime Squad, led by Lieutenant Rico “Soave” Tedone, who’d been Des’s semibright weasel of a sergeant back in her glory days. Soave was still working on that goatee and shaved-head look. And still not quite making it happen. He was a bulked-up bodybuilder but way short and way, way insecure. Not that he had a thing to worry about. Soave was wired right into the Waterbury Mafia, the tightly knit clan of Italian-American brothers, cousins and in-laws who pretty much ran the Connecticut State Police. Soave’s older brother, Angelo, and Angelo’s brother-in-law, Carl Polito, were high up on the ladder-right there under Deputy Superintendent Buck Mitry.
Des made her way down to the foot of Maple Lane and said, “Evening, Rico. How’s Tawny?”
“Big as an Escalade,” he answered proudly. The man had finally married his girlfriend of nine years and she was currently expecting their first child. Real? Des found it hard to imagine Soave as someone’s, anyone’s, father. But it was going to happen. Life went on. “The baby’s due any day now. I never know from one minute to the next when I’ll be flooring it to the hospital.”
“You’re just lucky you got such quality backup, little man.” His partner, Sergeant Yolanda Snipes, showed Des her huge smile. “Miss Thing, I have been missing you.”
“Back at you, Yolie.”
“What have you got for us, Des?” Soave wanted to know. “No, wait, don’t tell me. It’s Saturday night in quaint, cozy Dorset, where everyone is rich and WASP-y and perfect. So I’m going out on a limb here: It’s whack.”
“It’s all that, Rico. And more.”
“Break it down, will you?”
“Break it down?” Yolie let out a guffaw. “Sorry, is MC Hammer back in the house and no one told me?”
“My bad,” he growled at her. The two of them bickered nonstop. It was how they communicated. “Please run it for us. Yo, is that cool enough for you?”
“Yo, I’m cool twenty-four/seven,” Yolie fired back, her Latina’s liquid brown eyes twinkling at Des. She was a brash, fearless, hard charger with braided hair out of Hartford’s tough Frog Hollow section-half Cuban, half black and all pit bull. Yolie had put on twenty pounds of rock-hard muscle since she’d played the point for Coach Vivian Stringer at Rutgers. Her knit top was cropped at the shoulders, tattoos adorning both of her bulging biceps. Barefoot, she stood five feet nine. In her chunky heels she towered over Soave. Intimidated the hell out of him. Intimidated most of the men in the state police. She was tough, smart and she didn’t do well around fools. “Talk to me, girl-how’s your cute boy Mitch?”
“It’s going great. We’ve never been happier.”
“When are you two getting married?”
“It’s going great. We’ve never been happier.”
“I hear you. Won’t go near there no more.” Yolie heaved a sigh. “Me, I can’t even get a man to ask me out for a cup of coffee. Don’t matter whether he’s black, white or mauve…” She’d had a brief thing with Soave’s cousin Richie back when Richie was on Narcotics, but he was married now. “Is there something wrong with my personal hygiene?”
“Not a thing, Yolie. You’re terrific.”
“Yo, can we talk about the dead guy now?” Soave demanded.
“First I’d better give you a little background, Rico. We have an ongoing situation that began two weekends ago. A certain party in a ski mask who’s been-”
“This would be your weenie waver, right? Channel Eight was all over that. The news anchors could barely keep a straight face.”
“Yeah, it’s been a laugh riot-until now.”
Soave raised his chin at her. “Keep talking.”
“He’s been leaving presents, too. I got a special delivery on my very own welcome mat last night-a nice, fresh turd of human origin.”
Yolie blinked at her. “Ow, that’s just disgusting.”
“And our victim…?”
“Mr. Donatelli moved here ten months ago. He was a widower. Also a retired New York City police detective.”
Soave made a face. “Damn, that means his buds will be all over this.”
“He lived and worked two doors down, at the Captain Chadwick House. It’s a high-end condo complex. He was caretaker there, although the head of the board assured me he’d be getting bounced soon. The man was an obnoxious boor as well as a drinker. Never around when the tenants needed him. Plus he was borderline stalking one of them, a good-looking widow named Beth Breslauer.” Des shoved her heavy horn-rimmed glasses up her nose. “Between us, I thought that he might be the Dorset Flasher. So I was tailing him on foot just now when it all-”
“Wait, wait,” Yolie broke in. “You witnessed the murder?”
“Yes and no. I saw him leave his apartment. Pursued him as he made his way through the brush in the vicinity of the crime scene. I was definitely nearby when it happened. Heard a blow struck. Heard someone running away. Maybe one person. Maybe more than one. I can’t be sure because I couldn’t see a damned thing. A neighbor, Nan Sidell, heard someone prowling around and called it in. But she didn’t see anybody either.”
Soave thumbed his moustache, pondering this. “So, what, someone else besides you was following him?”
“That’s certainly one possibility.”
“Who would want to do that?”
“That all depends, Rico. If Augie was, in fact, the Dorset Flasher, then what we’re looking at here could be an unsubtle form of payback.”
He stared at her. “You mean like a vigilante killing?
“I do.”
“Whoa, I don’t like the sound of that at all. Is there another scenario?”
“That Augie was out here following the Dorset Flasher himself-once a cop, always a cop. Yesterday, he suggested to me that he might have an idea who our man was. I advised him to stay out of it. Could be he didn’t follow my advice. Could be our Dorset Flasher graduated to the big time tonight.”
“Killed Augie Donatelli to conceal his identity?”
“Exactly.”
“Any chance it’s none of the above?” Yolie wondered. “How about this neighbor? What’s up with her?”
“Nan tips the scales at ninety-five pounds, tops, and has no motive.”
“We know this for a fact?”
“Yolie, we don’t know anything for a fact. And I have to lay something else on you folks that you’re not going to like. Augie and I had a public altercation yesterday. He did a lot of yelling and ended up flat on his butt.”
“You hit him?”
“I didn’t so much as touch him, Rico. He was drunk, that’s all.”
“But there were witnesses?”
“Several.”
“And now the man’s dead and you were on the scene when it happened. Des, is there any way a district prosecutor could mount a reasonable argument that you’re actually a suspect in this murder?”
“I’m afraid so. Let me make this next part easy for you, okay? No, I didn’t do it. And, yes, I know I have to step far, far away from your investigation. After we’re done here I’ll give you all of my notes on the Dorset Flasher case. Every suspect I’ve looked at. We can sit down together over at Town Hall.”
“Is that the place that smells like mothballs?” he asked.
“Always.”
“Every time we set up there I swear I’m visiting my grandmother’s house.” He looked at Des uneasily. “We’ll have to notify your barracks commander about this. You may be chained to a desk for the duration. Which sucks, but it is what it is. ”
“I know this, Rico.”
“Okay then.” He rubbed his hands together briskly. “Let’s have a look.”
The death investigator was crouched over Augie, whose body was exactly as Des had found it. The bloodied baseball bat remained in the weeds nearby.
“This Louisville Slugger has seen a lot of honest playing time,” Soave observed, bending over it for a closer look. “Handle’s all nicked up. Ain’t exactly current issue either-it’s a freaking Mickey Mantle 125.”
Yolie whipped out her Blackberry and went Googling. “You got that right, boss man,” she said after a moment, peering at the bat for herself. “It was manufactured some time between 1964 and ’72. The Mantle bats made prior to ’64 had the trademark insignia under that oval label where it says Hillerich and Bradsby Co. This one here has the trademark in that circled ‘R’ after the words Louisville Slugger. It’s a collectible. Worth north of two hundred in perfect condition. Beat up like this one maybe seventy-five.”
“Augie was a native New Yorker,” Des said. “And the right age to have been a Mantle fan. This could have been his bat. That totally works except…”
“Except what?” Soave asked her.
“I’d swear he wasn’t carrying a baseball bat.”
“So how did it get out here?”
“Good question, Rico.”
Soave turned to the death investigator and said, “What can you tell us?”
“The victim suffered two blows,” he answered cautiously. “One blow’s to the left side of his head. The striking pattern’s horizontal, suggesting that his attacker swung at him pretty much the way you would if you were hitting a baseball. That blow, I’m guessing, stunned him and sent him to his knees. The second blow, which was the fatal one, is an overhead chop. His attacker wielded the bat like an axe.”
“Any idea about the attacker’s size?”
“The blows are substantial. Not the Incredible Hulk, but no weakling either. As to height, that’s difficult to gauge. If the victim was sneaking his way through the brush in the dark then we have to assume he was hunched over, not upright, which will significantly impact our calculations concerning the angle of the first blow. All I can tell you so far is that his attacker need not have been someone tall. Hopefully we’ll know more after we get him on the table.”
“So we’re talking about a man of average height and weight,” Soave concluded, shoving his lower lip in and out.
“Which happens to match the general description of the Dorset Flasher,” Des said. “Unless… could his attacker have been a good-sized woman?”
“Don’t see why not,” the death investigator replied. “If she surprised him.”
“Oh, I’d say Augie was good and surprised. Did you find a black ski mask on him?”
“No ski mask.”
Soave moved away from the body now, Yolie and Des trailing along. “We’ll search the neighborhood trash cans for that ski mask. And undertake a more thorough search of the grounds at daylight.”
“I’d pay particular attention to the riverbank if I were you,” Des advised.
“Will do,” Yolie said.
“You folks ready to head over to Town Hall now?”
“First give us the short version,” Soave responded. “If Augie Donatelli wasn’t the Dorset Flasher then who are you liking for it?”
Des stood there, hands on her hips, mulling it over. “Persons of interest do come to mind. One is Hal Chapman. I’d crossed him off my list, but based on his behavior earlier this evening I’d have to put him back on.”
“What kind of behavior?”
“He went semiballistic at a cocktail party over at the Captain Chadwick condos. I was there. You see, a childhood friend of Mitch’s is getting-”
“I knew it!” erupted Soave, who’d never had any use for the unlikely civilian in Des’s life. “I knew Berger would end up in the middle of this.”
“His friend, Kenny Lapidus, is engaged to marry a local yoga instructor named Kimberly Farrell. Her father is Dex Farrell. The Dex Farrell.”
“That thieving bastard cost me almost thirty grand,” Soave grumbled. “I’d like to punch him out.”
“You and everybody else. The Farrells live in the Captain Chadwick House. So does Kenny’s mom, Beth.”
“Is this the Beth Breslauer who the victim was hassling?” asked Yolie.
“The same. Hal’s a trainer at Kimberly’s fitness center. I knew he had a history-exposed himself to a girl back in high school. I also knew he was a major player with the ladies. But I didn’t know until tonight that he’s seriously into Kimberly. And has a major temper.”
“Okay, who else do you like?” Soave pressed her.
“You’ll also want to look at a local housepainter-slash-garbage head named J. Z. Cliffe,” Des answered, not bothering to mention the source of this particular lead. “J. Z. has a grudge against the rich old ladies in town. His girlfriend works nights. And he used to be married to Kimberly.”
“Sounds like this girl’s smack-dab in the middle of it,” Yolie said.
“I never trust yoga teachers,” Soave blustered. “That whole mellow act of theirs is a complete crock.”
“Time out…” Yolie whipped out her notepad and pen. “Sometimes I just have to write this stuff down.”
“And then there’s Kenny,” Des went on. “He’s a big-time computer geek up in Cambridge. Comes down every weekend to see Kimberly. Before tonight he didn’t strike me as a likely candidate to be our Flasher. But he’s in play now. I saw him out on his mother’s porch getting busy with Kimberly shortly before the attack. Once I took off after Augie, who knows where Kenny went.”
“Kimberly would know,” Yolie said.
“I saw something else just before the attack-Beth slipped out of the building and headed down Dorset Street alone on foot.”
“Was she carrying a Louisville Slugger by any chance?”
“Just her purse, Rico. And she was headed in the opposite direction of the crime scene. Still, she was out and about when this went down. And she was feeling harassed by Augie. And here’s one other thing you ought to know: Augie suggested to me that Beth Breslauer isn’t who she appears to be.”
“Meaning what exactly?”
“Damned if I know.”
“Well, who does she appear to be?”
“A well-heeled doctor’s widow from Scarsdale. When Mitch was a kid in Stuyvesant Town she was his neighbor. Her name was Lapidus then.”
Soave thumbed his moustache as he considered all of this. “Des, let’s be straight about one thing-do you or do you not believe that Augie Donatelli was the Dorset Flasher?”
She took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. “No, Rico, I don’t.”
“You’ve changed your mind about him?”
“Yes, I have.”
“Why?”
“Because we’re standing here looking at him, that’s why.”
Later, she climbed the narrow stairs up to Mitch’s darkened sleeping loft and crawled into bed next to him, stretching her naked self out against him.
“Gee, mom, is it time for school already?” he murmured.
“Very funny.”
“What time is it?”
“Just after three. Go back to sleep, baby.”
“Not a chance.” He kissed her, running his hands up and down her back. “Just give me ten more seconds to wake up and I’ll go fetch the lavender oil.”
“Not tonight. Go back to sleep, okay?”
“Something’s happened. What is it?”
“Somebody beat Augie Donatelli’s brains in. I found him in the bushes next to Rut Peck’s house.”
“My God, who…?”
“Either he was attacked by the Flasher or by someone who thought he was the Flasher. That’s the working theory, anyhow.”
Mitch’s sleeping loft wasn’t wired for electricity. He struck a match to light the oil lantern. She promptly blew it out.
“Don’t you want to talk about this?”
“I’m all talked out,” she replied. “Until nine a.m., which is when I’ll be getting my head chewed off by my barracks commander.”
“Why will Rundle be pissed at you?”
“Because I was tailing Augie when it went down. Hell, I was practically on top of the crime scene. And I had that public scene with him on Friday.”
“They don’t think you killed him, do they?”
“There are some people around town who definitely will.”
“Which people?”
“The ones who want me gone. Don’t approve of me.”
“Like First Selectman Bob Paffin, for instance?”
“Well, yes, now that you mention it.” She snuggled against him, hugging him tight. “Or do you think I’m being a paranoid nut job?”
“When I was growing up my parents used to tell me that there were people out there who hated us on spec-simply for being Jews. I didn’t think they were nut jobs. And I don’t think you are. In fact, I know you’re not.”
“Rundle will probably chain me to a desk until the case is closed.”
“All because you were out there doing your job tonight?”
“Basically. The good news is that Soave and Yolie are on it.”
“Not to worry then. They’ll figure out who killed Augie. Or I should say Yolie will. Mr. Potato Head will just puff and preen and say dorky things.” Mitch had reciprocal warm, fuzzy feelings for Rico. He cradled her face in his hands, his own face very close to hers. “Nobody who knows you-really knows you-will believe you had anything to do with it. And anyone who does think that, well, you’ll never win them over in a million years. So screw them.”
She caressed his cheek with hers, kissing him softly. “I don’t know what I’d do right now if I didn’t have you.”
“Now you know exactly how I feel every minute of every day.”
“How did I get so lucky?”
“Luck had nothing to do with it, thinny. I chased after you.”
“Did not. I’m the one who chased after you.”
“I was just letting you think that. It was my play all of the way.”
“Armando…?”
“Hmmm-mmm…?”
“Go get the lavender oil.”